(Source) Content warning: Rape, sexual assault. It has only been six months since a shocking whistleblower allegation regarding forced hysterectomies and medical neglect at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) detention center in Georgia. Dawn Wooten, a licensed nurse who previously worked at the ICE detention center — the privately-operated Irwin County Detention Center — filed a complaint regarding the numerous hysterectomies performed on Spanish-speaking immigrant women without any prior informed consent. She also expressed concern over the alleged deliberate “lack of medical care, unsafe work practices and absence of adequate protection against COVID-19.” In 2020, these allegations — reproductive organs being forcibly removed without the woman’s consent — almost sounded too inhumane to be true. These allegations, however, have brought to light that forced sterilizations are a remnant of the long legacy of eugenics in the United States and, contrary to popular belief, are not a relic of the past but a harsh reality even today. Sir Francis Galton, Charles Darwin’s half-cousin, coined the term “eugenics” in 1883. The term stemmed from an inaccurate interpretation of Gregor Mendel’s pea pods and Darwin’s theories and stood for the idea that many social ills were perpetuated by rapid reproduction and growth [read more]